Announcing the Inaugural Conference of The Louisiana Shakespeare Project,LOUISIANA STATE UNIVERSITY, Baton Rouge, October 10-11, 2008. Proposalsfor twenty-minute papers on Shakespeare, carnival, and early modernculture are invited.

Potential topics might include:Reconsiderations of the work of Bakhtin, C. L. Barber, and other classictheorists of carnival;Shakespeare, performance, and carnival;Shakespeare, film, and carnival;Ritual, theatre, and carnival;Gender and festive culture;Finding carnival in all the wrong places: sermons, religious polemic,murder pamphlets, etc.;Late medieval carnival and transitions into the Renaissance;Reformation and carnival (or the Reformation and Lent).

300-word abstracts must be received by March 28. Send to: Alison GrahamBertolini, Department of English, Louisiana State University, BatonRouge, LA 70803, or by e-mail to: abert_at_lsu.edu (Pleaseinclude â€œabstractâ€ in email title).